Data Center Network Engineer

Michael J. Schweitzer

Arvada, CO 303-***-****

www.linkedin.com/in/MJSchweitzer **********@*****.***

Information Technology & Business Professional

Extensive and diverse background in designing and leading IT solution projects and teams. Over 25 years have contributed to, built and managed technologies and teams in network engineering in global enterprise, wireless, data center, and carrier-level networking operations. Experience in project discovery, architecture and design, to implementation of complex LAN / WAN and wireless networks, and data center backbone. Bring innovative IT solutions to support client business objectives and engineering goals. Cross-industry experience includes manufacturing, distribution systems, financial, healthcare, media, and energy / utility control environments.

High-performing, knowledgeable, and creative team lead and solutions engineer. Have supported project demands, from complex infrastructure architecture to managing technical, business, and vendor relationships. Team-centric collaborator, bringing enthusiasm and innovation to position of responsibility while drawing on interpersonal skills to build partnership across organizations.

Core Competencies Include:

Team Building and Leadership Project Management LAN / WAN / Wireless Architecture IP Networking DIA Global Networking Design & Support SIP VoIP SD-WAN Cloud SASE Solution Design and Presentation

Summary of Recent Professional Experience

Ascendion, Greenwood Village, Co 2023 to 2024

Senior Network Engineering Manager

Built new group of Network Engineers and Project Managers into national team in support of projects with US cable broadcast media provider. Started two projects for complex platform lifecycle upgrades of different services.

High demand Pilot Program to upgrade and standardize backbone networking designs in multiple regional data center service hubs. Success of the Pilot will become model for expanded project to hundreds of DC Hub sites. Projects are contracted with aggressive timeline expectations.

Developed project roadmap with client and our Project Management and engineering teams. Defining processes, project milestones, budgets, and training to identify steps and variables expected at sites. Review of architecture, services and connectivity topology per-site. Identify requirements for several Method of Procedures (MOP) required per step/per site.

Worked with our contracted and Charter engineering teams in organizing transition strategies. These included designing BGP AS’s, OSPF areas, and IS-IS Level-1 and Level-2 area protocols used in exiting production network. Mapping transition plans with testing and production configurations from existing legacy Cisco to new Juniper router platforms. Also, created efficiencies through process modeling and automation scripts to save time and constancies in configurations.

NTT, INC., Greenwood Village, CO 2017 to 2023

Senior Enterprise Architect / Solutions Architect / Team Lead and Trainer

Working with account management and client technical teams to design and manage solutioning of complex global requirements. Building scalable managed global IT solutions for global customers. From discovery, architecture, design connectivity solutions and managed services to meet business project goals. Projects required capacity management, redundancy and diverse connectivity, designing SD-WAN migrations, and SIP networking architecture.

Development of P5G technology to track, monitor, and manage manufacturing processes for a global client. Our work included acquisition and testing of complex customer products. Use of P5G wireless solutions allowed automation and control of assets making many processes more efficient.

Designed network transformation for a global manufacturing company from legacy MPLS WAN networking to managed SD-WAN. Worked with Telcos and providers of public and private Cloud in US, APAC, and EMEA regions. Design with Silver Peak has improved application performance and resiliency to eliminate outages affecting their global business.

Resolved WAN BGP protocol issues within segments of a customer’s global networks. Issues affected clients’ business and progress required to proceed with upgrades customer requesting in an RFP. Led effort partnering with EMEA telco engineers to troubleshoot and manage this BGP issues discovered within EMEA NNI. Designed solution. Worked with engineering teams with British Telcom, Deutsche Telkom, and NTT Global Networks to peer one BGP AS# for the customer networks riding on their backbones. This success led to strengthened relationships that resulted in winning a large portion of the RFP. Additional projects included a global SD-WAN with Silver Peak and Cisco Meraki. Implemented using NTT GIN Teir-1 IP backbones for client’s global data centers, SIP voice, and other networking solutions with this customer.

Managed cross-team support with NTT internal organizations for assessments, designs, and deployment of upgraded IT security equipment. Facilitated a managed Services Walk-In Take-Over for hundreds of global offices, manufacturing plants, and distribution locations. Results were improved operations, monitoring visibility, and response times of customers’ regional and global businesses.

AT&T GLOBAL SERVICES, Golden, CO 2012 to 2017

Senior Network Engineer / Project Lead

Worked with and led team engineering support of multi-state energy utility company with complex networking for enterprise businesses, distributed data centers, and utility production management and control systems. Design and develop switching, routing, and access controls, for wired, wireless, and microwave solutions required to meet department requirements and compliance standards. Design, deploy, and provide teir-3 support of infrastructure for data centers, LAN and WANs, power plants and networked infrastructure.

Engineered integrations to upgraded enterprise, data center, and utility control networks, remote connectivity, systems, and storage solutions with legacy and dissimilar platforms. Configured integrations with Cisco and Juniper routing and switching products. Designed transitions from Cisco Catalyst to Nexus platforms. Migrated complex VRF LANs to Spine and Leaf. Designed and tested Microwave (MW) networking to extend WAN connectivity. Configured multi-protocol LAN/WAN route redistributions: BGP, OSPF, EIGRP, and static routing, and Wi-Fi/MW networking.

Built lab environments to test integration of networking platforms, technologies, and working configurations to model for production designs. Laboratory proof-of-concept and “pilot” configurations would be migrated to production data center LAN and WAN connectivity to support growth, scalability, and emerging technologies.

Provided engineering and steady state support to all customer sites (headquarter buildings, service centers, data centers, power plants, and substations) networks.

Researched with engineering and often led management of teams in root cause analysis for risk mitigation strategies. Discovered patterns of errors logged indicated traffic and networking alerts. Proactively replaced faulty equipment before failure and outage occurred.

DENVER INTERNATIONAL AIRPORT, Denver, CO 2011 to 2012

Senior Wireless Network Engineering

Assigned to lead projects to re-engineer multi-tenant and passenger wireless Wi-Fi networks at DIA. These included business enterprise, public (passenger), vendor and retail stores, Airport Rescue and Fire (ARF), and several airlines’ networks. Compiled data on Wi-Fi coverage (Heat Maps) for entire airport footprint. Proposed multi-phase solution plans, Including L2 and L3 network segmentation, configurations to support each Wi-Fi user case. Planned upgrade from existing 801.11a and 802.11b equipment to 801.11g technology. Built on extensive experience with Wi-Fi controllers, routing and switching, and security. Prioritized traffic routing to develop configurations, hardware placement planning and testing, and platform upgrades needed to accomplish goals.

Created Wi-Fi controller models for a 3-Phase project implementation. Added sign-in authentication to support over 2500 concurrent users and more than 25,000 daily users. Initial phases were low cost with excellent results. The airport was recognized by the public, with local TV news and press that upgrade improved passenger Wi-Fi performance. DIA management considered the project an exceptional success. Worked directly with CTO at DIA to implement further phases of project plans. Designs became the template for upgrades of Wi-Fi infrastructure when current equipment was replaced at “End of Life”.

Project lead of wireless project expansion, supporting upgrades needed at several airport fire stations and training facilities. This included new technologies on firefighting and event response equipment (mobile command vehicle, wireless scanners, computer-based equipment data and telemetry tools).

Trained support desk and operations (NOC) to serve first-level customer calls, and second-level NOC Ops and other engineers while service as 3rd-level support point of contact.

Professional Development and Certifications

Coursework in Electrical Engineering, Berkshire College, Pittsfield, MA

Silver Peak: SD-WAN Professional

Cisco: Black Belt Stage1 (ISE, DNA, ThousandEyes), ICND, Routing and Switching – CCNA

Industry Certifications and Compliances: HIPPA, Sarbanes-Oxley, SCADA, PCI

Technology

Networking:

Routing, Switching: Cisco ISR, ASR, Catalyst, Nexus, Juniper, 3Com, Dell, HP

SD-WAN:

Silver Peak, Meraki, Viptella

Load Balance & Optimization:

Cisco CSS & ACE, Riverbed, F5

Protocols:

IP v4 & v6, BGP, OSPF, EIGRP, IS-IS, SIP, 802.11 wireless

Data Center:

Structured Wiring, Telco Rooms, Flexpod, Hadoop, Nutanix, Exadata, VM, VDI

Wireless:

Cisco, Meru, Avaya WAPs & Controllers

WAN:

MPLS, ELL, TDM, DWDM, Microwave, Satellite, Wireless, DIA

Firewall & Security:

Checkpoint, Cisco ASA & Firepower, Fortinet

VoIP:

Cisco UCaaS, Avaya IP Office

NMS & EMS:

Cisco ISE, DNA & Thousand Eyes, Packet Capture & Analysis, ServiceNow, MRTG, NerveCenter, ProMon, WireShark, SNMP

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